U.S. taxpayers are shouldering ever-increasing costs for the care and feeding of minors grabbed up at the border. The cost to maintain a family bed, which keeps mothers and children together in a family residential center, costs around $319 a day, according to Department of Homeland (DHS) Security budget data.
The creation of tent cities – put up to house the influx of thousands of unaccompanied minors – has raised the stakes considerably. Beds in those rudimentary facilities run a whopping $775 per person per night, a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services official told NBC News.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement estimates the average stay in detention is 44 days. Though that may be a low-ball figure, there is no doubt that the daily census is increasing as a result of stricter border enforcement by the Trump administration.
DHS projects there will be an average of 51,379 people held in immigration detention centers each day in fiscal 2018, a sizable jump from the last few years, which have hovered near the low 30,000s.
Federal grants for shelters, foster care and other child welfare services for detained unaccompanied and separated children soared from $74.5 million in 2007 to $958 million in 2017, according to a new Associated Press report.
Costs are spiking as the government is requesting bids for additional services totaling more than $500 million.
The outlays show how serious border control comes at substantial expense.
Beyond the billion-plus dollars in private contracts for temporary accommodations of young illegals come larger embedded costs of maintaining immigration-enforcement agencies throughout the country and the bureaucracies to administer them.
“Illegal immigration costs our country hundreds of billions of dollars,” President Donald Trump said recently in reference to those costs.
“Imagine if we could spend that money to help bring opportunity to our inner cities and our rural communities and our roads and our highways and our schools.”
Indeed.
Confronting the magnitude of this country’s immigration mess, President Trump is taking the only responsible position — increased enforcement at the border and in the nation’s interior that upholds the rule of law and deters illegal immigrants in the long run.
Immigration enthusiasts and fellow travelers on the far Left can feign fiscal concern about the costs of preventing mass illegal immigration all they want, while choosing to ignore the much larger costs of not enforcing our laws. Those costs, according a comprehensive analysis by FAIR run U.S. taxpayers more than $115 billion annually. Detention costs are pennies on those dollars.
Enforcing laws is expensive. Not enforcing laws is even more expensive and potentially dangerous.
13 Comments
The administration has made it abundantly clear that these refugees are not wanted…send back.
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Insostenible estos incrementos de presupuesto en Control Fronterizo a traves de los anos Segun Estadisticas de DHS desde 2010 hasta 2017 FY solamente han entrado cercano al 1,000,000 de centroamericanos y mejicanos por concepto de menores no acompanados y acompanados ppr familiares. A eso sumele el costo de los tribunales de inmigracion y de mantener a ese millon, que tienen tambien la virtud de reproducirse para tener hijos anclas ciudadanos Los Costos de escuelas para esos menores subrayados y mas factores creando en esas escuelas agloimeracion y congestionamiento que ademas sufragamos los contribuyentes con nuestros impuestos aunque nom ,estemos de acuerdo con estos, ilegales y sus consecuencias. ,.
712/5000
Unsustainable these budget increases in Border Control over the years According to DHS Statistics from 2010 to 2017 FY have only entered close to 1,000,000 Central Americans and Mexicans for unaccompanied minors and accompanied by family members. To that add the cost of the immigration courts and to maintain that million, which also have the virtue of reproducing to have children anchors citizens Costs of schools for those minors underlined and more factors creating in those schools agglomeration and congestion that we also pay taxpayers with our taxes although nom, we agree with these, illegal and their consequences.
Just go back 32 yrs. of broken promises by the democrats & add up all the money that illegal foreign invasion on our borders has cost the taxpayer. My brain is too old to do it. But I do believe we could have built a Wall both North & South & built military bases on our borders to stop all the illegal foreign national invasion. Then it would have been money well spent
we need to look at the democrats who is holding this up..and not making laws against all illegals in our nation. we are going broke with them in our nation. no more catch and release…..catch and send back thru mexico, we should not have to bear the expense of deportation, free airplane flights…they got here and they can find their way back. they were either bused to our border or drove to our borders by families…./they come here because of abuse in their nation..how many are abused right here in the usa, by families , husbands, etc…stay in their nation and fight for their nation, just like we do./………, asylum can be in their nations not the usa …..it is time their leaders start to lead their nation and just do they do with our taxmoney when they get it….bet they use it for weapons or their pockets…..no more giving foreign aid to these nations, not going to the right cause….
And that cost doesn’t include all the court cost and lawyers giving these illegal’s a right to our Judicial system. Just send them back over the border, it’s cheaper. Nnot to mention the cost of those sitting in jails, prison’s and these detention center’s on our dime. The back log in court cases.
Why are they given presidency over our court system while legal American’s have to sit and wait for their cases to be heard and due process.
This was Obama and Clinton plan to bankrupt American’s. Turn us into a 3rd world country like Venezuela. Their still trying to. Congress distracts and delays from confirming new nominees to replace Obama’s crooks in court rooms.
Anyone want to tell me I’m wrong and why ?
Thanks to all working diligently at FAIRUS.org and JudicialWatch.com along with Our President Trump.
Still to many crooks in the soup kitchen.
Still trying to wrap my brain around $775 per person per night. This is the sum of government incompetence + illegal alien lawlessness in a corrupted culture that has traded national sovereignty for collective “compassion.”
We should charge Illegal aliens’ countries for sending their citizens across our border….Mexico & Central America should have this money deducted from the foreign aid money that is sent from our country…Corrupt politicians are very careless with our tax money so they can garner a vote from the illegals…
Old British expression sometimes used in this country. Penny wise, pound {dollar} foolish. Meaning pinching pennies but overlooking the big expenses. That’s the case here. Whatever initial money it takes to get border crossings under control will be worth it. What is unsustainable is the present system of catch and release which only brings more people. Illegals don’t seem to be as stupid as the left is. They, and their relatives back home, get the fact that the overwhelming odds are that once they are released from custody with a court date years down the road, they are for all intents and purposes here to stay. Many never even show up for that court date, and there is no incentive to, because nothing is done if they are later caught. Illegal entry is all rewards, no punishment, for most of them.
The group arrested in New Mexico is led by Siraj Wahhaj, the son of an Imam at a New Jersey mosque, who has the same name. The father was an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, which only failed to bring down one tower because the van was parked in the wrong place. Wahhaj Sr. has stated he would never tell Muslims not to use violence, and “We are commanded to do jihad”. Why was this man not deported? But that’s hardly the extent of it. Just last month Linda Sarsour, a Muslim leftist darling and prominent supporter of many Democrats including Bernie Sanders, called the father her “mentor, motivator and encourager”. So where was the condemnation of the media on this?
Completely agree, get the home country’s involved in retrieving these children and individuals.
These costs are staggering. What makes BORDER JUMPERS entitled to such lavish expenditures? Ship ’em back as quickly as possible and take the load off the innocent taxpayers.
Completely agree, get the home country’s involved in retrieving these children and individuals.
One solution is obvious . . . . Stop the illegal children from entering the country. If the parents continue into the country after the children have been stopped they are abandoning thier children and that makes them that much more undesirable. I have been to some of the areas where the illegals cross. There is no way I would subject a child under the age of 16 to these conditions and possible death
The administration has made it abundantly clear that this group is unwanted..stop playing games and send them back.